The Specter Emperor let out a low groan like a dozen trumpets grouped together, and launched a few smaller Specters out from its body, like a cell going through mitosis except it wasn’t splitting into two identical cells. Instead, tens of small baby Specters shot out of the Emperor’s body like bullets, and flew towards Finn and Iris. Unfortunately for the Emperor, however, Finn and Iris were no easy foes.

Iris smirked and aimed her gun, then unleashed a volley of bullets in rapid succession while flicking her aim from one Specter to another. As she ran out of ammo, she wasted no time trying to reload, and instead called upon her newfound power to send out a barrage of tracking crescent-shaped projectiles towards the Specters. In the matter of a few seconds, the Specters flying towards the two were gone, reduced to atoms, paving a clean way for Finn to gapclose the Emperor.

“Now, Ace!”

“… On it.”

Without any hesitation, Finn dove towards the Emperor with his abyssal black wings, and cut the slime-like being directly in half. The powerful Voidheart blade sliced through the amorphous entity with ease like a knife cutting tofu, and the Emperor wailed in pain once more.

Backing away, Finn returned to hovering beside Iris, but he did not sheathe his blade just yet.

“Well,” Iris murmured, folding her arms. “That was easier than expected.”

“… Almost too easy,” Finn muttered, furrowing his brows. “Does it still have a life signal?”

“Hm…” Iris narrowed her eyes, then used the Oculus Angelica to scan the divided Emperor for any sign of life. But what she found was…

“… No way.”

“What is it?” Finn asked, immediately tensing up once more, and Iris’s voice was quivering as she spoke.

“T-The life signal… it… divided in two.”

“…!”

As if on cue, the Emperor—or rather, Emperors—wailed in unison, now two medium-sized blobs instead of one large one. They shrieked and unleashed their mini-Specter drone attack once more, to which Iris once again countered the same way. However, this time, it was harder, as the number of enemies had multiplied.

“… Tch.” Finn readied his sword once more, but rather than go in this time, he used the blade to help Iris deflect incoming Specter bullets.

Unfortunately, the Emperors weren’t about to let them have their way. One of the two suddenly leaped up into the air and prepared to crush Finn beneath it, and because he was busy taking care of the other smaller Specters, there was no time to dodge. Instead, he put up his sword in guard, and the edge of the blade ended up slicing the Emperor in two. Then, just like before, two smaller Emperors rose up in its place, each with the same powers that an Emperor has—summoning other Ghosts.

Now, there were three Emperors on the field, and there would only be more if this continued.

“This is bad…!” Iris gritted her teeth, stating the obvious as she once again repelled the incoming barrage of nano-Specter bullets, this time from different directions as well.

Then, the other Emperor also leaped up and attacked the same way, not giving the two any chance to fight back. Finn tried to avoid cutting it this time by blocking with the flat side of the sword, but due to its Voidheart, charged up nature, the Emperor was cut anyway. Now, there were four on the field, and they collectively let out a low-pitched noise that sounded creepily like laughter—as if they had intended for this to happen from the very beginning.

“Idiots…!” The man from before yelled using the last of his remaining strength. “Did you two… really… come in here… unequipped…?!”

“No!” Iris shouted back as she let out another volley of projectile attacks to fight back against the nano Specters. “We got proper equipment from the House of Spectra, but… wait… wait, could it be…”

Finn, knowing what she was referring to, quickly pulled out the scanner-like device they had received in the box earlier that had contained the rest of their Specter equipment. At the time, they had deemed it to be a tool of unknown purposes, but perhaps it was intended to be something else. Something… more on the offensive side.

The four Emperors attacked Finn at the exact same time this round, thinking that even if he could deflect all four of them, the next time will be with eight. Eventually, he will be unable to defend any longer. However-

“… Hmph. Don’t get cocky.”

This time, rather than using his blade to defend, Finn calmly held up the scanner-like device and aimed it in the direction of one of the four Emperors closing in on him.

“EE—!” It screamed loudly as it came into direct line of sight with the scanner’s scope, but the scream was quickly cut short. Finn had no time to worry about this, however, as he rolled forward in the direction of the Emperor her subjugated in order to avoid the other three’s powerful pincer attack.

“Ace—the one you scanned—it froze!” Iris called out, then promptly unleashed a powerful sniper round into the frozen Emperor, shattering it into many pieces instantly. Unlike before, however, these broken fragments remained grey and dead, not becoming new Emperors.

“EEE…” The remaining three Emperors slowly backed away, realizing that the two Ghost Hunters had figured out their trick and came prepared, but Finn and Iris weren’t about to just let them get away.

“… You’re done for.”

Sword in one hand, scanner device in the other, Finn dashed towards the three Emperors at full speed, scanning each one after another. As the amorphous entities froze and lost their white color, instead dimming into a grey, lifeless hue, Iris, who was behind Finn, unleashed a sniper bullet into each, shattering them to pieces. With a perfect combination of teamwork and powerful synergy, Ace and Ivy made quick work of the defenseless Emperors now that their trick was revealed.

“… And that’s that,” Iris declared once all four had been shattered. “Now then…”

She turned to the swirling black portal that had opened up a short ways off from where they currently were, where a treasure chest also lay.

“… Shall we return?”